Female Orc Chr14 (Charismatic): CR 14;
Medium Humanoid (6 ft. 1 in. tall); HD 14d6+14; hp 51; Init +2; Spd 30 ft (6 squares); AC 13, touch 13, flat- footed 11; Base Atk +10; Grp +8; Atk +8 melee (1d4–1, +1 dagger of venom); Full Atk +8/+3 melee (1d4–1, +1 dagger of venom); Face/Reach 5 ft./5 ft.; SA spells; SQ art of magic, empathic link, force of personality, orc racial traits, scry on familiar, share spells, spells, sum- mon familiar; AL NE; SV Fort +4, Ref +5, Will +11; Str 6, Dex 12, Con 10, Int 17, Wis 14, Cha 21.
Skills: Appraise +6, Bluff +17, Concentration +17, Craft (alchemy) +11, Craft (jewelry) +13, Diplomacy +15, Handle Animal +9, Heal +6, Intimidate +24, Knowledge (arcana) +18, Knowledge (nature) +13, Knowledge (Northern Marches) +7, Knowledge (religion) +15, Profession (herbalist) +19, Sense Motive +16, Spellcraft +12, Survival +8.
Feats: Alertness (when within 5 ft. of familiar), Brew Herbal Concoctions, Brew Potion, Magecraft, Craft Spell Talisman, Craft Greater Spell Talisman, Extend Spell, Heighten Spell, Spell Focus (necroman- cy), Spell Focus (enchantment), Spellcasting (conjura- tion), Spellcasting (divination), Spellcasting (enchant- ment), Spellcasting (necromancy), Spellcasting (trans- mutation), Spellcasting (universal).
Spells Known (8 0-lvl spells/day; 19 points of spell energy/day; DC 15 + spell level; † enchantment and necromancy spells are DC 16 + spell level): 0— arcane mark, daze, detect magic, guidance, mage hand, mending; 1st—charm person†, hypnotism†, identify, mage armor, obscuring mist, ray of enfeeblement†, sleep†; 2nd—alter self, animal trance†, blindness/deaf- ness†, enthrall†, locate object, scare†, speak with ani- mals, web; 3rd—clairaudience/clairvoyance, dominate animal†, hold person†, stinking cloud, suggestion†; 4th—bestow curse†, confusion†, contagion†, detect scrying, fear†, locate creature, modify memory†, poly- morph, scrying; 5th—cloudkill, dominate person†, mind fog†, prying eyes, telepathic bond; 6th—circle of death†, geas/quest†, mass suggestion†, symbol of fear†; 7th—finger of death†, symbol of weakness†.
Rituals: telepathic bond, dominate person. Languages: Black Tongue, Old Dwarven Pidgin, High Elven Pidgin, Orcish, Norther, High Elven,
Colonial, Erenlander.
Possessions: filthy rags, tattered cloak of Charisma +2, greater spell talisman (enchantment), ring of protec- tion +1, +1 dagger of venom, potion of invisibility.
Cra’ak, Raven Familiar; CR 7; Tiny Animal; HD
7d8; hp 25; Init +7 (+3 Dex, +4 Improved Initiative); Spd 10 ft., fly 50 ft.; AC 21, touch 14, flat-footed 19; Base Atk +10; Atk +12 melee (1d2–5, claws); Full Atk +12/+7 melee (1d2–5, claws); Face/Reach 2-1/2 ft./0 ft.; SA —; SQ empathic link, deliver touch spells, improved eva- sion, share spells, speak with master, speak with birds, SR 19; AL NE; SV Fort +5, Ref +6, Will +11; Str 1, Dex 15, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 14, Cha 6.
Skills: Listen +6, Spot +6. Feats: Weapon Finesse (claws).
Morgatha started life in the frigid north, born into the tribe of the Mother of the Blooded Claw. She was part of a large brood struggling for scraps of food and power. Morgatha was a tiny orc child, born with weak limbs and a warped spine, but she did not suffer from most orcs’ lack of presence or sense of self. She sur- vived, and even prospered, using her two special gifts: the spark of magic, and the quick mind and convincing presence necessary to easily manipulate her brood mates. By the time her “blood thickened,” Morgatha had
44 Chapter Four: Muster of Steel Hill
recruited the other younglings as her agents and used them to eliminate all those who could be rivals.
Morgatha’s actions and inherent power brought her to the attention of the kurasatch udareen. She was sent to the caverns of the priest-mothers, there to serve and study the sacred lore of the dark god. Morgatha learned the secrets imparted by the ancient high priestesses and demonstrated great aptitude for dark magic. After long years of arduous trials, Morgatha returned to her tribal lands as a kurasatch udareen and took up her place among the worthy priest-mothers of her people. Yet this honored role seemed insufficient to the witch; she felt that Izrador meant for her to do more, to be more, than just the moth- er of yet another bloodline.
So, when the warriors of the Mother of the Blooded Claw marched to join their brethren in the killing fields of Erethor, Morgatha accompanied them as their spiritual guide. The war raged endlessly on, as it had for countless years, and many of her people died to elven blade and arrow. But the elves were not the only danger on the war front: the sly legates of the Order of Shadow, long having thought they were superior to the kurasatch udareen, played their petty games of intrigue and power; they fought not for Izrador’s glory but for their own aggrandizement. Morgatha did what she could to spoil the legates’ plans and chose a protégé, the oruk Sharzun, to aid her. Sharzun was the strong arm to com- plement her consummate powers of enchantment. It appeared that the witch had chosen well: Sharzun led his warriors to many victories, each a tithe bloodily taken from the elves and every one a thorn of aggravation in the legates’ sides.
As the years of war passed in the shadow of the Witch Queen’s domain, Morgatha felt a calling from the north; not the frozen north of her birth, but closer at hand in the brooding peaks of the western mountains. Morgatha left Sharzun to journey into the lands of the Lía Rudh Emyn, seeking out the source of this strange summons. Among the snow-clad peaks of the Highhorns, she found a singular tree, an evil hulk that pulsed with dark power; beneath it she discovered a hid- den cave, and in this ancient nexus of power she made her lair.
While Morgatha courted spirits of power in the cold mountains, her enemies in the Order of Shadow moved against her. Sharzun barely escaped Erethor with his life, and his forces were decimated. Knowing they had lost the battle, Morgatha decided to regroup, using Steel Hill as a base. She needed to marshal her strength and take time to plot her revenge.
Since that time, Morgatha has become powerful in Steel Hill, though she largely manipulates from behind the scenes. Using her familiar as an intermediary and flock leader, and calling upon the black tree’s powers, she has performed a ritual to sway the flights of ravens and rooks that mob the valleys, bending them to her will and making them her willing spies. While the ritual granted them little more intelligence than most birds,
each of the creatures can remember a few overheard words and can project into Morgatha’s or her familiar’s mind the appearance of the words’ speakers. Given that there are so many ravens and rooks (and seemingly more arriving every day to serve the witch), there is lit- tle that occurs in the city or its domain of which the Raven Crone does not have at least some inkling. Sharzun, ever her faithful servant, now commands Cruach Emyn’s garrison, and only Prince Aushav and the Bloodguard truly stand in her way. The legates of Scath na’Cruach are ineffectual and weakly led, and although the sword brethren pose a threat, they are too few to cause real problems outside the temple ward.
Ultimately, Morgatha seeks to humiliate the Order, and she has succeeded to an extent by isolating Dorgath and his cronies and subjugating Vylaria, the Order’s much vaunted preceptor. However, the witch wants more than this: she wishes to rule Steel Hill, to be the iron mind behind Sharzun’s iron fist, to make the city the home of the Mother of the Blooded Claw tribe. The humans, Aushav’s followers in particular, would serve the orcs, and she would become high priestess, unfet- tered by the sneering arrogance of the Order’s legates.
Sharzun the Bloodaxe, Lord
Commander of the Splintered
Skull Legion
Male Oruk Ftr12: CR 14; Large Giant (9 ft. 3 in.
tall); HD 3d8+12d10+60; hp 149; Init +5; Spd 20 ft.; AC 19, touch 11, flat-footed 18; Base Atk +14; Grp +25; Atk +25 melee (3d6+16/19–20/x3, +2 wounding greataxe) or +15 ranged (1d8+7, javelin); Full Atk +25/+20/+15 melee (3d6+11/19–20/x3, +2 wounding greataxe) or +15 range (1d8+7, javelin); SA —; SQ darkvision 60 ft., light sensitivity, orc/ogre blood; AL NE ; SV Fort +14, Ref +6, Will +8; Str 24, Dex 12, Con 18, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 8.
Skills: Climb +7, Intimidate +14, Jump +8, Knowledge (warfare) +3, Listen +4, Profession (soldier) +16, Spot +4.
Feats: Cleave, Diehard, Endurance, Great Cleave, Greater Weapon Focus (greataxe), Greater Weapon Specialization (greataxe), Improved Critical (greataxe), Improved Initiative, Improved Sunder, Iron Will, Power Attack, Weapon Focus (greataxe), Weapon Specialization (greataxe).
Languages: Black Tongue, Erenlander, Norther, Orcish.
Possessions: Well-made, sturdy clothes of heavy cloth and tanned leather (black and gray), heavy hobnail boots, black +2 banded mail, thick leather belt, well- made armor greaves, +2 wounding greataxe, large fight- ing knife with jeweled pommel, large belt pouch con- taining 100 gilden coins, amulet of health +2 (red tear- drop shaped quartz, capped with silver and hung on a silver chain), +1 ring of protection, 3 potions of cure
45 Chapter Four: Muster of Steel Hill
moderate wounds, black raven’s feather (Quaal’s feath- er token: bird)
Sharzun was the same as countless others of his race: vicious, cruel, and born with a belly full of rage. It was during his years in the Erethor Forest on the front lines of the war effort against the hated fey that he came into his own and distinguished himself from the horde. The war-band in which Sharzun served was led by a strong but largely incompetent orc by the name of Skaar. This dim-witted brute was the pawn of the legate Halgrim, whose plotting ways were well known (and feared) in the Legion of the Cowl.
For reasons best known to himself, Halgrim sent Skaar’s warband on a suicide mission against a particu- larly well defended elven settlement; the legate intend- ed Skaar’s force to fail. As the arrows rained death onto the orcs, Sharzun watched his commander panic and blunder deeper into the elvish trap. Fearing for himself and his warriors, Sharzun tried to convince Skaar to retreat; the War Captain reacted violently to this insur- rection, and promised the oruk a painful death on their return to camp. It took only a single blow of Sharzun’s massive axe to nullify this promise and transfer leader- ship to himself. He quickly took control and developed an impromptu strategy using false retreats and the fact that his troops looked half-dead already. When the elves sent scouts out to track the orcs’ trail, they found them- selves surrounded by barely living but still quite enraged orcs. The wounded orcs died under a hail of arrows, but not before gutting the elves and pushing them deeper into the forest, where Sharzun and the rest of his troops waited. The pitiless oruk then used the still-living elves as both bait to draw out more elven warriors, desperate to save their fellows, and as living shields at whom the elven archers could not bring them- selves to fire. This nobility cost them their lives and their fortress. This was the first time, but not the last, that Sharzun demonstrated a primal cleverness and rare military acuity that could turn the tide of many a seem- ingly lost battle.
Halgrim was not pleased that Sharzun had ruined his plans, and he sought to exact a terrible revenge. However, the young soldier had a hidden ally; the aged kurasatch udareen of his tribe, Morgatha, had been observing Halgrim’s machinations for some time, and recognized great potential in the young oruk who had snatched victory in the face of overwhelming odds. Warning Sharzun of Halgrim’s plans, Morgatha helped him set a deadly trap for the sly legate. It was a trap the priest didn’t escape.
Sharzun continued his tour of Erethor, leading his warriors from one hard-won victory to the next and inspiring a fierce loyalty in those that survived. Among these was a redoubtable half-ogre/half-troll called Azorl the Tusk who, after a particularly savage battle, swore a blood-oath of fealty to Sharzun, vowing to stand by his side as long as he could draw breath. Morgatha let him
46 Chapter Four: Muster of Steel Hill
make his own decisions and follow his instincts, but was always ready to whisper wisdom in his ear or expose his enemies’ secrets for him, should either be necessary. With this capable assistance, Sharzun rose quickly through the ranks of Jahzir’s army.
In his eighth year in Erethor, Sharzun’s earlier conflict with the Order of Shadow returned to confront him. New legates replaced Halgrim after his death, and they hungered to repay the grievous insult paid to their order. The legates chose their time well, waiting for the witch to be absent from her champion’s side (Morgatha had journeyed into the north to tend, surreptitiously, plans that would consolidate her power base in years to come). Halgrim’s successors struck with swiftness and force: only Morgatha’s wards and the presence of Azorl saved Sharzun from their black fury. Even so, the oruk was sorely wounded and forced to flee into the Eris Aman. He was joined shortly after by most of his war- band, still loyal despite lies of Sharzun’s treason and cowardice that the legates had spread within the army. The Order had done its work well: Sharzun was no longer welcome in Jahzir’s army. It seemed as though Sharzun’s illustrious career was over.
Morgatha once more came to Sharzun’s rescue. Using her contacts and enchantments, the witch gave Sharzun a place of anonymity in the garrison at Steel
Hill. Over the years, Morgatha and Sharzun maneuvered and manipulated until Sharzun took command of the garrison in a brief but bloody coup reminiscent of events years before in Erethor. Although garrison commander of Steel Hill was a backwater post compared to his for- mer positions, the arms the city produced made it an important cog in the war machine. Sharzun would have to be satisfied.
Several years on, Sharzun has accepted his new position, but his hatred for the Order of Shadow remains strong. The bitter pill of his posting has been sweetened somewhat by the swelling of his ranks to a full legion thanks to recognition by Jahzir of Steel Hill’s military importance. However, Aushav, his arrogant Bloodguard, and the conniving legates—all reminders of his one- time humiliation and defeat—gnaw at Sharzun’s equa- nimity. He promises to himself and to Morgatha that, in time, all his enemies will pay.